1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a character recognition process. More particularly, the invention relates to a character recognition apparatus which recognizes a character by extracting white regions surrounded by strokes of character pattern information, to be recognized, and examines the directions of openings of the white regions to thereby recognize characters.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In character recognition, the characteristic of regions other than character regions in the character pattern information to be recognized, namely the white regions, are examined so as to determine the general characteristics of the character pattern and it is important to determine in which direction the white region is opened. However, determination of the direction of opening of the white region is often influenced by deformation or inclination of the character to be recognized and, especially in the case of hand-printed characters, it is necessary to take measures for reducing or obviating this influence as much as possible.